


Whiter Shade of Pale

by DelphiPsmith



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Hair, Obsession, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-06
Updated: 2010-09-06
Packaged: 2017-10-11 13:06:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/112720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DelphiPsmith/pseuds/DelphiPsmith
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hermione has a chance to indulge an obsession.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Whiter Shade of Pale

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [hp_uk_meetup](http://community.livejournal.com/hp_uk_meetup/).

She thinks about it all the time. She tries her best not to, but the most unexpected things remind her: milk pouring from a pitcher; clean sheets spread over a bed, their whiteness gleaming in the sun; the fur of an Arctic fox at the London Zoo. Spiderwebs. Shafts of silvery moonlight arrowing nightly across the darkness of her bed in Gryffindor Tower.

Brushing her coarse, bushy locks in the Gryffindor common room in the mornings, her fingertips tingle at the imagined sensation of long, silky strands sliding through them. She overhears a voice: "Oh yeah, he's here to see Draco." A laugh. "Making sure his arrogance is up to the Malfoy standard, I expect." A shiver sweeps through her; she closes her eyes and grips the edge of the porcelain sink, but the sensation of cool smooth whiteness so exactly corresponds to the image haunting her mind that she opens her eyes with a gasp.

Picking up her bookbag she slips out of the room, determined to take the less-used corridors to remove any chance of encountering him – surely he won't stay long – and hide out in one of the small sitting rooms until he leaves. She opens the door to the first one she finds; a cursory glance around the small room confirms its emptiness, so she enters, closes the door behind her. A fire burns on the hearth; a tall chair facing it sits beside a small table, an oval of lace draped over the back, and –

She stops. No. Not lace. A pale hand rests on the arm of the chair and now she hears it, the slow, even breathing of sleep. She drifts closer, more silent than one of the Hogwarts ghosts. Without consciously willing it, her hand stretches out towards the long hair flowing like molten white gold over the velvet upholstery, the tingling in her fingertips now an ache that throbs in time with her heartbeat. She runs her palm over it lightly, then carefully, gently, gathers it into a rope in both hands; it's more sensual than she could possibly have imagined, fine and thick, and it runs across her fingers like quicksilver. She closes her eyes, inhales its cool spicy scent, imagines it shimmering across naked skin...

The sleeper shifts in the chair. She leaps swiftly back, putting her hands behind her, and the hair falls back into place, more like a liquid than a solid. His head turns, revealing closed eyes, the crescent of silvery eyelashes brushing the aristocratic cheekbones, the sharp planes of his pale, proud face. She stands frozen as he awakens, opens his eyes, looks at her coldly.

"Miss Granger," he says with unmistakable contempt. "What an unexpected...pleasure."

"Mr. Malfoy," she manages to stammer out. "I was...looking for...just leaving." She darts from the room, and as she half-walks, half-runs down the hall, her mind fills with snow and white silk and moonlight, and she knows that nothing will be enough for her, ever again.


End file.
